


Never Learned to Heal

by razthelin (zarinthel)



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-05
Updated: 2019-10-05
Packaged: 2020-11-24 13:19:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20908313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zarinthel/pseuds/razthelin
Summary: set in the same verse as my multi-chapter Solace in Abyss. You don't need to read it to understand but if you're reading this then you'd probably like it anyway. Lot of refrences to ch6 of that in here.Spoilers for Dark Knight Questline through 50, Heavensward Spoilers





	Never Learned to Heal

**Author's Note:**

> set in the same verse as my multi-chapter Solace in Abyss. You don't need to read it to understand but if you're reading this then you'd probably like it anyway. Lot of refrences to ch6 of that in here. 
> 
> Spoilers for Dark Knight Questline through 50, Heavensward Spoilers

Zephirin’s dream always started the same awful, familiar way. He was kneeling in the cathedral, the night cold and freezing his knees. Then Fray would come pacing in, the same as that time. 

But that time, it had been Caligorne. 

In the dream, when Fray takes off their helmet, it's the knight he remembers. Brown hair that frames their skin, their slightly rounded ears, their height that made the warrior of light seem tall. That made Zephirin tower over them. 

Of course, when he’s kneeling, he can’t tower over anyone. 

They walk over beside him, but they don’t say anything. When Caligorne had done this, he’d put his hand on Zephirin’s shoulder, and directly communed with the abyss while on holy ground. But Fray doesn’t do that, though Zephirin’s sure its the type of thing they would find funny. 

In all his dreams, they just watch him, and then when dawn comes while he waits, Fray sneers, spits on the floor, and leaves. 

Every time, it’s been like that. 

Yesterday, Caligorne had tracked him down again. He’d looked at Zephirin with his strangely hued eyes, and then he’d pressed his soulstone into Zephirn’s hands. He said he’d be back for it tomorrow.

He said that, so that means that Zephirin only has one night to prove to Fray that he’s not the coward he died as. 

It starts the same way. He’s on his knees, offering his desperate prayers to Halone, pleading with her to forgive him, to get rid of the scales that hide beneath his armour like the marks from Fray’s teeth once did. 

_Please_, Zephirin thinks this time, but he’s not praying to Halone. His hands wrap around the dark red soulstone he wears around his neck. _Please, be here._

The door creaks open, and the armoured footfalls echo, as they do every time. _Please, please, please..._

He doesn’t realize he’s clenched his eyes shut until the boots stop beside him. 

“You’ve got a lot of nerve, booty calling a corpse,” Fray says to him. “I didn’t know you had it in you.” 

For a corpse, Fray looks remarkably well, much better than the last time Zephirin had seen them. The grief and rage that had always hung in the shadows of their face has faded, leaving the simple icy righteousness that had caused them to turn away from everything the Church held sacred. 

“All I had to do was hold the soulstone,” Zephirin says to him. It’s not the most grandiose of first words. 

Fray looks down at him. 

“That man loves to interfere,” He says, but it’s said with resigned fondness. He plucks the stone from Zephirin’s grasp, and holds it aloft, examining its facets. “He really gave it to you,” Fray murmurs, wonder plain in their tone. 

“Just for a night,” corrects Zephirin, throat dry. 

“Just for a night,” Fray agrees, and tosses the stone back to him. “You sure you want to do this in the cathedral, altar boy? Seems like an odd choice for you.” 

“It’s not my choice,” Zephirin bites out. 

“It’s your dream,” Fray says. “You could be anywhere in the world, but you’re right here, on your knees.” They crouch down beside Zephirin. “You’ve never done that for me before.” 

Fury, forgive him his sins, for they grow with each passing second. 

“Well?” asks Fray. “Halone won’t care if you’re naked, She sees that shit all the time.” 

Zephirin’s skin crawls with mortification. Must Fray always be so.. 

Before this, he’s always had too much pride to let Fray get away with this kind of thing. They always loved to taunt him, but Zephirin’s tongue was as sharp as his blade, and all of him was bound to the Ward, by word and steel and oath. 

But all that is behind him. 

It’s just for one night, he thinks, ignoring the voice that always whispers liar inside his mind. For one night, he can pretend to swear service to another. 

Everything seems so quiet inside his head. 

“Fray,” Zephirin says, numbly. “You know that it takes forever to take this armour off by myself.” 

“It’s your dream,” Fray says again. “Just snap your fingers.” 

Fray’s now ignored several _very_ clear openings that they previously would have jumped all over, using the cracks in Zephirin’s facade to pull him apart. Death has made them patient, and Zephirin realizes..the trial isn’t over. 

He still has things left to prove, and it fills him with terror. 

He’s never going to be able to do this again. 

Zephirin closes his eyes, and imagines it. Underneath his gauntlets, his bracers, his chest piece, white scales trace down his back, mark his neck, cover his shoulders, trace down his arms. When it's dark, some of them give off a soft white glow. 

Fray is going to laugh at him. 

Fray’s going to laugh at him, and Halone will look down on him, and it will be worse than the first time he tried to run bathwater after Azys Lla and tried to scrub his skin off but the scales were to hard--

He realizes he’s trembling. 

Distantly, he places his hand on top of his chest, and pushes. Fray is right, after all. He can just make his armour disappear. He can make himself as vulnerable he was the day that he so foolishly answered the call from beyond the Lifestream. He keeps pushing, feeling his white and blue slough off him like a strange, clingy layer of grime. 

Eventually, there’s nothing left. 

“I like the scales,” says Fray. “Sidurgu’s look better, though.” 

“Then maybe you should go haunt him,” Zephirin says, sourly. 

“I do,” Fray says. 

Their hand brushes down Zephirin’s spine. 

“You’re so still,” Fray comments. “Didn’t you use to lash out a little bit, at first? I thought it was part of the foreplay.” They wait a beat. “I like it a bit rough too, you know.” 

Zephirin’s hands tighten into fists, nails cutting into his palms. 

He knows. 

“But I think I could like you like this, to,” Fray says. “You’ve never been willing to blow me before.” 

That’s not true. It’s just... doing that, as a temple knight, then as a member of the Heaven’s Ward.. 

Fray slips a gauntleted hand under Zephirin’s chin and pulls it up, clearly wanting an audience as they snap their other hand to get rid of their armour, showing that they have just as much control over this false world as Zephirin does. 

Bastard. 

“But you’re willing now, Zephirin?” Fray’s lips quirk into the smile that so seldom lurks behind their helmet. Their thumb rubs across Zephirin’s lips. “Open up for me, then. Use that pretty mouth of yours for something useful.” 

It’s a trap. 

And yet..

Zephirin opens his mouth, and bites down on Fray’s finger. He presses his teeth into Fray’s flesh, feeling oddly wild. 

“Easy, prettyboy,” Fray says, mockingly. “I know you’re still a virgin when it comes to oral, but that’s no way to pop a cherry.” 

Zephirin can feel the flush building on his neck, and he hates it, hates how easy it is for Fray to get a rise out of him. Who’s fault is that that I never learned how, he wants to throw back at Fray, but it’s clearly not on them that he took his vows so seriously, that he never-- that he hasn’t visited Fray since he joined the Ward. 

“Like you’d know,” Zephirin says, bitter. 

“I give great head,” Fray says. He tucks another finger into Zephirin’s mouth, forcibly widening it so he can look at his teeth the way that gambler’s look at chocobo’s before the big race. “But if you chomp down on my cock, there’s a lot of things you’ll never find out, since I’ll make sure you never wake up. Do we have an agreement?” 

Jealousy pools in Zephirin’s stomach. He knows who Fray practiced on. 

He nods. 

Fray smirks. 

“Say ‘Ah’”

Fray can’t make him say that. The heat is building in his cheeks as it also, completely obvious to both of them, builds up down below. It's the same ugly chain it always is for Zephirin, where he and Fray both know that the more Fray pushes, the more he’ll give. But Fray has an iron code, limits he will never push. If Zephirin ever wants-- if he ever wants even a single glimpse past where Fray will stop, then-- 

Then he has to say yes. 

“I--,” Zephirin says, louder than he intended to. “I want to.” He can’t look at Fray. “I.. want to. You don’t have to make me.” 

The chill of the stone floor as long been banished by his pure embarrassment. 

“Look at me,” Fray says. His voice is closer to Zephirin’s ear than he was expecting, making him jerk his head back around on reflex. Then he gets.. Stuck, staring at Fray’s eyes. They’re usually so cold, staring at him with chilled disdain colder than the Archbishop himself. Even when they burn, it's a cold burn that freezes what it touches. 

But now their eyes are warm, flame behind tinted brown glass. 

“Maybe you’ve learned something after all, Zephirin.” 

Fray kisses him. 

It’s the first time they’ve ever done that. 

Zephirin leans forward in order to get closer, unable to completely suppress the low keen that seemed to come from deep within his own throat. He’s never allowed himself to wonder what it would be like. If Fray would bite his lips the way their nails bite into Zephrin’s back. If they would stare into his eyes, if they would use their hands to pull Zephirin in closer, swallow down the hypocrisy on his tongue like they swill low grade mead. 

If they would--

Fray pulls back. 

“I don’t know if anyone’s ever told you this,” they drawl. “But sex is generally at least a two person job. Didn’t your teachers used to compliment you on that? ‘Oh, Zephirin, so good at _active participation_’.” They do a scarily good impression of Zephirin’s old Scholastic instructor. 

Zephrin flushes. 

“I’m _trying,_” he bites out. His lips still sting from Fray’s touch. “Maybe if you’d kept going, I’d have figured it out.” 

Shouldn’t have said that. 

Fray raises an eyebrow. 

“Aw, Zephirin was that your first--”

They stop abruptly, a strange expression in their eyes. 

“No,” says Zephirin. 

“It _was_,” Fray says, after a long pause. “Did I never kiss you before? Did you never steal a kiss from a pretty girl cooing after your shadow? Ever get drunk and tumble one of your fellows?” 

He doesn't want to talk about this. 

“I got drunk and slept with you,” he points out anyway. 

“And what does that say about your taste,” Fray comments. 

Zephirin kisses them back. 

It’s an ugly kiss, the angle feels wrong, and Zephrin feels incredibly self conscious. He keeps expecting Fray to pull away. 

But they don’t. 

Fray leans towards him instead, their hands willfully dragging across the flesh and scales of Zephirin’s bare shoulders, pulling Zephirin off balance so he tumbles forward into Fray. The both of them suddenly become a tangled mess, as neither seems willing to break the kiss long enough to really see what’s going on. 

It’s better than anything Zephirin could have imagined. 

When they break apart, the small quirk of a smile is back on Fray’s face. It’s like its own kind of victory. 

“Well,” Fray acknowledges. “You taste pretty good.” 

It doesn’t mean anything. 

Zephrin licks his lips, searching for a lingering taste of Fray. 

“You know what I want, Zephirin?” Fray asks, abruptly. 

Zephirin has his hands braced against Fray’s chest. It’s only now that he can confirm that Fray has not been bothering to breathe. 

He’s never known what Fray wanted. 

All he knows is that it isn’t him.  
“  
Trick question. I’m dead, I don’t want anything.” Fray’s hands travel south, moving from his shoulders to cup his ass. 

Zephirin shivers. 

He hates Fray sometimes. 

“You just said you wanted a--” His mouth forms the words, but it's impossible for him to match Fray in their blunt speech. “That you wanted me to use my mouth for something else.” 

Fray’s hands pause. 

“I did say that.” 

They pull Zephirin closer, so that they’re practically hugging, naked, on the stone floor. Zephirin is nearly a head taller than Fray, but like this it doesn’t feel like it. He feels a sudden urge to tuck his head even further against Fray, but shoves it down. 

“Your scales are warm,” Fray comments. They’re still touching them, running their hands down Zephirin’s thighs. They tap their fingers against one and clearly enjoy feeling Zephirin flinch. 

They just ignored what Zephirin brought up. Are they-- do they want him to _ask_ to-- 

They definitely do. 

Zephirin feels his cock harden, and feels his stomach curdle as he knows that in this proximity, Fray can feel it to. 

“Thinking dirty thoughts, altar boy?” Fray’s tone is half taunting, half indifferent. As if they’ve already dismissed the chances of Zephirin ever voicing anything, ever doing anything. They’re hands still trace down Zephirin’s thighs, touch light and repetitive. 

It’s driving Zephirin mad. 

One of Fray’s fingers strays from their path to tap itself near Zephirin’s balls, casual and contemplative. 

“I probably don’t even have to prepare you,” Fray says, thoughtful. “You could just will it, think about being wet hard enough to make it happen.” 

Zephirin’s mind goes white for a short second. He thinks he can feel steam rising off his skin. 

“Not that you’d ever do that,” says Fray, voice still as close to placid as they get. “Too much of a tightass.” 

Fray is far, far too good at taunts. Zephirin just wants to shut them up, anyway he can. _They’d never expect you to_\-- But that’s the whole point, isn’t it. They don’t expect him to be... better. 

Fuck them, then. 

Zephirin grits his teeth. He can feel this chance slipping away from him like all the other ones before it, Fury damn him. 

“Fray.” The name comes out soft on his lips, pleading in a way that he did not intend. Endless fantasies fill his mouth like shards of glass, making his mouth bleed from the silence. 

“I don’t answer prayers, Zephirin,” Fray says, even though that’s not true. 

Zephirin’s mind flickers to when Valerian had visited him here, and cracked open his own soul to prove a quiet point. 

“You answered mine,” Zephirin says, desperately grasping after even a fraction of that destructive courage. He swallows. “Please, Fray. I want this to be--” Sacred. “I want this to be good.” 

“That’s up to you,” Fray says. But they cup the back of Zephirin’s head as they say that. “You’ve been licking your lips ever since earlier, prettyboy.” Their voice is cold, but the edge of mockery has been replaced by a low croon. They push Zephirin’s head down in a sudden motion, barely letting him rearrange his limbs for stability. “Here’s your chance, Zephirin. Show me that _we_ want this.” 

Zephirin’s eyes flutter as he willingly opens his mouth and sucks Fray’s cock, not quite understanding what the tug in his hair meant until Fray’s low laugh makes him realize that Fray’s been pulling him back, stopping him from choking. 

Zephirin swallows, and hears the laughter fall off to a low curse. 

“Enthusiastic, aren’t you,” Fray says, and there’s a hint of surprise in their tone. One of their thumbs rubs against Zephirin’s cheek, making Zephirn feel pressure from both sides as he gasps. 

“And you’re sensitive.” 

Fray’s hips rock forwards a little, and Zephirin moans. The sound is alien, startling. Zephirin didn’t know he could sound like that. He’s not sure he likes knowing. 

“_Very_ sensitive,” Fray corrects. 

Zephirin keeps going, pushing forward slowly to the point where it’s a struggle to breath. The minutes blend together in his head, leaving just an endless desire to be closer, to have more, to make Fray keep making those small startled noises--

“_Zephirin_,” Fray says, grip tightening in his hair. 

He wants to hear his name again. 

“Zephirin. Pull off now, or swallow.” 

It’s hard for him to process the instruction, but there’s one thing that he’s sure about-- he doesn’t want to move. 

Fray makes a short sigh, and their fingers loosen their grip on Zephirin’s hair in lax euphoria as they stop holding back, coming into Zephirin’s mouth. The taste is... strange, and not all that pleasant, but heat still curls in his stomach. He’s got Fray inside of him now. 

A little bit of Fray is _his._

“That’s enough, prettyboy.” 

He’s never heard Fray sound so fond. 

“You’ve convinced me.” Fray wipes their thumb across Zephirin’s lip, sending another shiver through him. “Spread your legs, and I’ll show you what it’s like to be good.” 

A shudder hits Zephirin by surprise, and his hands claw at his thighs in order to-- to stop himself from-- 

Fray’s low chuckle does _not_ help. 

“Consider it my last trial,” they say. 

A chance to prove his worth. He doesn’t get many of those, now or ever. Zephirin tilts his head up, so that he can meet Fray’s eyes. And then, self conscious and careful, he sits down on the cold stone, which does nothing to dull the heat that still keeps him on the edge of his control. 

His eyes still fixed on Fray, Zephirin awkwardly moves his legs apart, feeling every damned scale that scrapes across the ground. He knows that Fray-- he knows that Fray doesn’t mind but--

They’re so _ugly._

He wants Fray to see him as... perfect. He’s not like Sidurgu. His scales are his own hubris and complacency carved into his flesh by ancient vengeance and cold mercy. They write his sins into his every attempt at living. 

Fray brushes a rough hand through Zephirin’s hair. 

“You’re in good hands,” they say. 

Fray’s other hand, already slick with warm oil, pushes inside of him. Zephirin tries to stop the instinctive clench, tries to stop his body from betraying how much he wants Fray close, inside of him, on top of him. The last time they’d done this-- a very long time ago-- Fray hadn’t bothered with fingers. 

They must like watching Zephirin convulse. 

He can feel the delirium haze descending on him, the place inside of himself he only knows when he’s with Fray. Embarrassing, humiliating things seem reasonable to him when he’s like this. His tongue loosens, and strange things slip out. 

“Fray...” He murmurs, back arching off the ground as they curl their fingers. “Fray!” There’s no meaning to the word beyond the joy of saying it. 

“Already..?” Fray’s reply drifts in his ears. “Heh. Well, even if you’re still tight.. Injuries won’t transfer.” 

The first thrust takes Zephirin by surprise, sending shockwaves of pleasure that overheat his mind and send tingles down every finger and toe. So does the next.. And the next.. And on and on and _on._

It feels like being claimed. He wants the aches to last forever, to live right beside the scales on him, to be able to have that second sign that someone-- that Fray-- thought he was worth having. 

_“Please,”_ Zephirin begs, hoarse and unable to understand what, exactly, he wants Fray to do. Please harder, please faster, please brand me, please come back from the dead, please-- 

Fray kisses him, rough and quick. 

“You pass, Zephirin,” They say. “You’ve been good for me.” 

Zephirin shakes so hard his head bangs into the floor, but it's not enough to resist the desperate, messy climax that guts him with his own intensity. His spasming muscles keep clenching around Fray, still hard inside of him. 

“I’m not done yet,” Fray says. “At your limit, prettyboy?” 

No, no, he doesn’t want Fray to leave him empty. 

“Stay,” he whispers. 

Fray pays no heed to his word, resuming their relentless pace while the sensitivity on Zephirin’s side deeps the pain and pleasure that comes from being marked on the inside. 

He never wants it to end. 

But all good things do. 

Fray makes a low, guttural sound as they hit their own limit, finishing the job they’d started of leaving Zephirin an absolute mess. 

For a few minutes, the two simply wait in silence, quiet and drained. 

“I’ll be gone when you wake up,” Fray says. 

Zephirin closes his eyes. 

“I know.” 

He doesn’t know how he’s going to deal with that. 

“You’ll be fine,” says Fray, strangely gentle. 

“I’m not like you,” Zephirin says, weary. “I never learned how to heal.” 

Fray snorts. 

“You think conjury prepared me for anything? You think it helped Valerian when he needed it most? Get your head out of your ass, Zephirin. And learn some first aid.” 

Their eyes turn distant. 

“You have to give the soulstone back. We like being with him.” 

He doesn’t want to. 

Fray smiles at him. 

“Spit it out, prettyboy.” 

“I...” He’s too much of a coward. “I want to see you again.” 

Fray raises their eyebrow. 

“There’s more than one dark knight soulstone in Ishgard, Zephirin.” They’re blurring at the edges, turning into nothing more than a shadow before Zephirin’s eyes.  
“We’ll be waiting.” 

They’re gone. 

Zephirin wants to stay, wants to spend time even in this empty church that Fray abandoned, but the dream shatters around him, not even letting him cradle the illusion. 

He wakes with Valerian’s soulstone still gripped tightly in his hands. 

“Fray...” He whispers. 

There’s no response.

**Author's Note:**

> i love comments : )


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